The need and use of foods, including beverages, confectionaries, medicines and the like is one of the primary needs and basic cravings of both animals and humans. The universal use of naturally occurring and synthetic foods and the like to satisfy this natural need has not been met without its accompanying disadvantages. For example, many foods and the like are subjected to deterioration by naturally occurring and induced environmental conditions that either render them unfit for consumption or severely lessen the nutritional value of the food. It is known that the nutritional value of foods arises from its major ingredients consisting of carbohydrates, fats, proteins, vitamins and other useful nutrients and that deterioration and spoilage can occur either simultaneously for all the ingredients or for a single one. For example, the carbohydrate portion of many food products can lose its nutritive value by readily undergoing oxidation or other reactions as evidenced by discoloration and off-flavors. The discoloration often is due to autoxidation of valuable natural pigments such as carotenes and the like or to a chemical browning reaction that can occur between carbohydrates and essential amino acids present in foods.
Similarly, foodstuffs containing fats and oils often become unacceptable for use by undergoing oxidative deterioration which results in off-flavors and off-odors usually termed rancid. This deterioration is generally due to their tendency to absorb or react with oxygen, and the observed rancidity results primarily from the products formed during oxidation. These products generally include unwanted peroxides, aldehydes, ketones and acids that impart an undesirable odor, taste and color to the foodstuff thereby making their use unacceptable. Proteins too are broken down by adverse conditions as they take up oxygen that constantly converts the protein to a different form as for example in the discoloration in meats such as in cured bacon and sausage. Also, certain therapeutic preparations such as those containing vitamin A have been subjected to considerable loss because the vitamin is unstable in the presence of atmosphere that readily oxidizes the vitamin to the corresponding useless product. Livestock and poultry feeds fortified with said vitamins for many years have been subjected to considerable loss of nutritive value due to these oxidizing influences.
In view of the above presentation many attempts have been made by the art to stabilize food substances and the like. These attempts usually involved adding known antioxidants to the substance or synthesizing new compounds with the hope that they would overcome the prior art problems. These antioxidants, whether known to the prior art or newly synthesized, usually functioned by a common mechanism such as hydrogen donation by the antioxidant, electron donation or addition by the antioxidant, forming a complex between the food substance and the antioxidant, by adding a chemical group to the food substance and the like. While these prior art antioxidants of diverse chemical structures such as phenolics, amines, carbonyl-amine reaction products, heterocyclics and the like in many instances stabilized the food, their mere addition presented certain disadvantages to the user. For example, on ingestion the antioxidants have no food value, they can break down to undefined moieties and they often are of questionable safety. These latter conditions are especially troublesome if the antioxidant is absorbed from the gastrointestinal tract or used in appreciable quantities. To overcome these unwanted disadvantages considerable research effort and expenditures have been made to develop alternative compounds that could fulfill the requirements of an antioxidant without possessing their inherent disadvantages. However, these alternatives, while often stabilizing the food, also are absorbed from the gastrointestinal tract and present like problems to the user. In view of the disadvantages associated with the prior art forms of antioxidants it becomes apparent that an immediate and pressing need exists for both new and useful antioxidants that are essentially free from the unwanted effects associated with the prior art type of antioxidants and simultaneously satisfy the inherent needs of both animals and humans.